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“Yes,” Sirus declared sharply to put an end to it. Niah had her own prerogative for following Levian. Their conversation had been grating, but he had no doubt they’d understood one another. She would keep out of his way, and he would keep out of hers. He’d only spoken to her once, and perhaps wouldn’t again for the rest of their stay. The house was large enough for them to avoid one another.
Barith spat on the ground, wiped the fae wine sweat off his brow, and picked up his sword. “You think Levian will figure it out, then? What Gwen’s magicks are? What she is?”
“Yes.” If anyone could, it was Levian. Sirus only hoped she would find answers sooner rather than later. The moment he thought it, a burst of magick shot through the library window, sending glass spraying over the lawn.
Chapter Ten
Gwen opened her eyes and let out a stuttered breath. A faint blue light trailed up from her outstretched palms. Her skin hummed with energy. Energy that felt alive.
It isn’t possible.
She didn’t notice the blown-out windows or the cracked walls. She didn’t notice the books and papers strewn everywhere, the bones of Levian’s horned whale scattered and broken. Gwen only saw that blue light. She only felt the hum of energy coming from inside her. Magick. Her magick. She felt it coursing through her. It felt like chaos. It felt like life. It felt amazing. Like something locked away deep inside her had finally been set free. Like she’d been set free. It was terrifying. She wanted more.
No. She shouldn’t want more. But the taste of that power was intoxicating. The taste of her power.
The blue trail twirled around her hands.
Faintly, she recognized a voice in the periphery. Deep and calm.
She managed to look up from her hands into a pair of frost-blue eyes. Sirus’s face was damp with sweat, his expression mostly stoic, but there was a severity in his eyes. A concern. “Breathe,” he told her.
Gwen took in a rasped breath at his command. Her head was dizzy. She tasted metal in the back of her throat.
He took a step closer. She focused on him. Only him. Him and the hum of her skin. That energy that called to her.
Reality began to seep into her with each shallow breath. Everything her world was built on had been shattered in an instant. She was shattered. Broken open.
This is your reality. Gwen could hear Sirus’s voice in her head from the night before. Could feel the harsh cut of the words shoot through her like a bullet through tissue paper.
She wanted to hide. To run. To disappear. But she couldn’t do any of those things. She couldn’t run away from this. From herself. Unbridled fear ripped into her, tearing through the fractured strands of what she’d always known.
Her eyes were locked on him. He’d known. From the beginning, Sirus had known the truth. He’d known this deep dark secret buried inside her. He knew her better than she even knew herself. In the distance, she registered hot tears running down her cheeks.
“Breathe,” he told her again, his voice calm and focused as he came that much closer.
She did, breathing the smell of sandalwood and spice and tree deep into her lungs. Gwen clung to the feeling of warmth it sent through her. She breathed again. Sirus was here. If he was here, she was safe. He’d told her she would be safe.
The hum of magick subsided slowly, and all the energy she had went with it, leaving her empty. Somewhere along the edges of her mind, Gwen registered the warmth of his body pressed against hers. Realized that she’d collapsed, and he’d caught her.
Her head rolled back, and she looked up into his face. Those cold eyes darkened. When she felt the last strands of her strength give way, Gwen didn’t try to fight it. Sirus was here. She was safe. With one last breath full of him, she fell willingly into the calm embrace of darkness.
* * *
Gwendolyn’s fear had been palpable as she’d stared up at him. Her eyes wide, not with shock and confusion, but with knowing. A knowing she seemed desperate to undo. She’d barely breathed as she stared up at him. Unflinching.
It had shaken him to his core.
Sirus held Gwendolyn’s frail, limp body in his arms. A small trickle of blood ran down her nose. Even when she was unconscious he could feel the skitter of her magicks on his skin. He pushed himself to focus.
“Are you alright?” Niah asked Levian, whose eyes hadn’t moved from Gwendolyn. The mage was pressed against a cabinet, her arms out uneasily, as if suspended in the motion of casting magick. She blinked.
“Levian?” Barith pressed with a touch of worry. The mage startled, her trance broken. Her eyes shot between them all and over the room. Her stunned expression didn’t shift.
Sirus turned to face her. The mage looked back down at Gwendolyn and blinked away her shock, righting herself, before darting over to them. He stepped back when Levian reached out to touch her. The mage’s eyes shot up to his with anxious frustration. “I need to check her,” she declared flatly.
He hesitated a fraction, then nodded, letting her approach. Levian took Gwendolyn’s limp hand and mumbled a spell under her breath. “I think she’s fine,” she said with a sigh of relief. “The weight of it just exhausted her.”
She gingerly released Gwendolyn’s hand and looked down at her with pained worry.
